Cold and Broken Hallelujah
by Hidden Guardian
Summary: ONESHOT. LEMON. SEX WITH A DEAD BODY! Crehador, who found the two, thought it was both a blessing and a curse to get to say a final goodbye, but especially so to the demanding little princess who stole his heart and pride with that same damn smirk.


In case anyone can't tell, I'm on a Count Cain kick right now. I just got the raw scans and script for book 8. … Seriously

**If you have not read Godchild 8, do not read this**.

My friend, Mary, almost shot me in the head when I let slip… what happened.

Disclaimer: I forgot to put one of these on Warm on Winter Nights. Anyway, I don't own Count Cain!

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Crehador slipped the ring into his pocket and stared at the beautiful young earl, wrapped in the fleshless, bony arms of the man that he had loved with a coquettish smirk on his rose-petal pink lips.

The medium gently leaned down and brushed a few errant strands of the raven's wing hair out of his face. "It should never have come to this," he told the two. "You shouldn't have had to die to be together." From the beginning, he should have known that it was going to turn out like this. From the first time he saw the two together, and the tall but gentle manservant had held his lord close to his chest as that little boy with the occult fetish threw himself off of the roof.

Yes, the two had certainly been close. The magnitude of Cain's anger and sorrow after Riff's betrayal made it impossible to hide exactly how close. Crehador had secretly hated Riff for putting that expression on the lord count's face.

But this one… this beautiful smirk was not much better, if only because, once again, the silver-haired servant had put it there.

Crehador sighed and reached out, grabbing both of Riff's bony arms. "I'm sorry, but I can't bring myself to leave the two of you here. God knows Little Lord Brat will end up buried in some Hargreaves Family Plot on a grassy hill with flowers and angel statues." He shuddered when his fingers brushed Cain's skin. It was still so warm. "And I don't think you two want to be buried apart after all it took you to be together again."

He gently moved Riff's arms from around Cain, the brittle bones making soft rattling sounds as he did so. He was careful, oh so careful, and managed to get them far enough apart. "Alright," he thought out loud. He knew it was in so many ways wrong to be talking to the corpses of two… not _friends_ per se. But being a medium, it didn't bother him much, morally. "Cain first since he's smaller."

Putting one hand under the earl's legs and another behind his skinny back, he managed to pick Cain up bridal style, promising himself that he would come back for Riff as soon as he got the Lord settled. He figured that Riff, the Riff Cain had so desperately wanted to believe in, would want it that way.

He snapped the reins and decided to head for the less developed area outside of London. There was no place suiting for the two's final resting place in the crowded, disease-infested streets. Crehador figured that, when he found the right spot, he would know it.

After about five minutes, he came across a field that hadn't been built upon, not even by the farmers or rich people who owned 'country' houses. It was too hilly for a proper structure, but flowers grew everywhere on its sides.

"Perfect," he thought, pulling to a stop. He opened the back door and pulled Cain's body out, holding him close to his chest. "Nice and romantic, and I bet half of these contain _some_ kind of poison for you to play with." He smirked and carried Cain up to the very top of the hill. He looked down at the ground and frowned.

"Damn. Didn't think about an actual hole to put you two in." He laid Cain down in the dark red flowers and looked around for anything he might be able to dig up the dirt with. "Damn again!" he cursed. He went back to the carriage and was not surprised to find a shovel. After all, he had stolen it from Cain, the grave robbing count.

He walked back up the hill, ready to do actual… _physical labor_, the proof that he cared for Cain, when he paused and started to stare.

Nothing about the seventeen-year-old laying in the red flowers seemed _dead_. His lips were still formed in that know-it-all smirk that said nothing of this pathetic world could touch him. His eyes were closed, but it seemed more like he had fallen asleep in the middle of a good book than what had really happened.

"I wonder if I could channel your spirit just one time. Probably not. You'd sit down there in your little throne in Hell laughing at me."

He let the shovel fall flat on the ground and knelt down on his knees by the fallen lord. "Always such a demanding princess. You used that idiot Baron Gabriel until the end, and even your manservant was so tied to you that he couldn't live without being your dog." But the accusations were not malicious.

Crehador was one of Cain's slaves, too.

Slowly, he leaned over the count and pressed his lips to the still warm but rapidly cooling ones underneath him. Just as he had always imagined, they were soft, like silk. He moaned and realized in that moment, as he slipped his tongue out to trace the permanent pout, just how trapped in Cain's web he truly was.

Mediums and witches go to Hell. It was all part of the Christian faith. It was why séances were forbidden, situation be damned. Crehador cared nothing for the sanctity of the dead - unless they were the people he had loved - and he cheated and stole as a way of life. If he was going to go to hell anyway, why not indulge himself?

He reached up and snagged a bit of the raven-wing black hair in his fingers, tugging back lightly and opening Cain's mouth, allowing his tongue to slip inside. There, too, the last remnants of life were slipping away. No seductively playful tongue met his, there was no bite in response to his boldness or slender body pushing him onto his own back like he had imagined it. But the taste was the same. Bitter, like acid, laced with the taste of Riff's tea.

Without hurrying, knowing that he would throw himself on a raging fire before ever thinking that this could happen more than once, he stripped off the dirty, torn suit that Cain had been wearing. It didn't suit him anymore. It wasn't pristine and perfect. If Cain's clothes couldn't do him justice, then he would just not have to wear any.

Cain's body was small and effeminate. His ribs just barely showed through the skin on his chest, and Crehador could tell that he was a noble; no sun had ever touched him for long enough to give him color. He looked like the Bianca Nevada, or 'Snow White', that his mother had told him stories about before she, too, left him behind. Cain certainly was spoiled enough to be a princess, but Crehador's kiss had failed to wake him and his true prince was dead along with him.

"Well. He was far from an innocent. Maybe it will take more than one little kiss to wake him up. 'The post-mortem fucking of true love'," he joked, bitterly. He reached out and ran two fingers down Cain's chest. So pale. So white. The only points that stood out were the two small nipples, the same rose-pink as his lips. Curriously, for he had only ever seen them on the ends of breasts before, he placed a finger on top of one of them. It was hard.

"So men really do die turned on," he said, glancing down at the junction between Cain's long, effeminately curved legs. Sure enough.

Crehador moved down Cain's body and spread the slender legs to get a better look. He was… surprisingly normal. Cain was such an odd creature that, really, he hadn't known what to expect. He even laughed a bit, though he knew that, if Cain could have heard him, he would have poisoned him to a slow and painful end.

He ran his finger along the underside of the shaft and down to the heavy orbs hanging underneath. He knew that Cain had done it with girls. He wasn't exactly romantic about it, but they threw themselves at him anyway. Whether or not he had had sex with a man… that he didn't know.

If so, he would have with Riff, Crehador felt sure, and he never got that feeling from the two of them. Of course, neither was stupid. They might have just hid it well under that self-sacrificing master-servant act.

Either way, Cain deserved some care and consideration, not that he was well known for giving it to those around him. He pressed a finger to the tight entrance between the plump buttocks. It didn't let him in easily, and he had to push a bit harder to make it sink inside. Ah. There, it was still warm.

He ran his finger along the soft, almost velvet-like skin inside of that place curiously, having never felt anything like it before. He wondered vaguely why it wasn't bothering him that he was about to have sex with a **dead** male, but he stifled that thought mercilessly and sent it crawling, beaten and crying, to the back of his mind.

Gentle, always gentle, he pushed another finger in. The muscle did not clamp down on him and there was no moan of the pain he imagined Cain would voice when he could _feel_ the pressure and stretching around him. He knew that, with the body slipping into rigor mortis and unable to relax, he would have to take his time.

Eventually, he got Cain's body to open up enough to where he believed that he could fit inside of him. "I'm sorry about this," he said, "but if you would have allowed me when you were alive, it wouldn't have turned out this way."

He pulled his fingers out and grabbed the base of his own length, which had grown hard as he had stroked and prepared Cain. He guided himself inside and groaned as he sank in to the hilt without any resistance.

"God, Cain," he breathed, staring down into the still smirking face underneath him. So beautiful. He started to thrust lightly in and out of him and his eyelashes fluttered as he felt the tight muscle wrapped around him.

Crehador leaned down and pressed his lips onto the Earl of Poison's, licking and kissing him as passionately as he had been before, but even more so as he began to pant lightly, a sheen of sweat building up on his body from the pressure between his own legs as he shifted back and forth, thrusting into Cain's body.

He kissed Cain's forehead and cheeks and neck desperately, almost like he wanted to worship every bit of the beautiful Count's flesh with his lips and tongue. "Is this what it would have been like if you had loved me instead of being such a little tease?" He fisted his hands in Cain's raven hair, resting his forearms against the silky petals underneath them that gave Cain a halo of red.

Crehador could finally admit it; he was angry! Why Riff?! Why, when he and Baron Gabriel and even his sister had been willing to accompany Cain to hell, did the princess laugh at their offers and refuse to take any but that man along for the ride? What had he done to deserve it!

He groaned deep in his throat as he gave Cain's hair a sharp tug, finding his release inside of the body. He rode it out with soft, short thrusts but realized, as he did so, that all life was gone from Cain. His flesh was cold and he still hadn't moved an inch. Crehador felt sick to his stomach, now, by an act that he had truly believed that he had wanted to do and hadn't regretted at the time.

He stood up and grabbed the shovel, releasing his frustration onto the ground until there was a hole long and deep enough to hold Cain laid on his back, deciding after a long mental debate that they should lay side by side, but with their own graves. He picked Cain up and gently laid him down in the hole before covering him slowly with the dirt, starting at his feet.

"Goodbye, Princess Cain," he said, smiling a bit as he covered him completely until not a bit of the Lord's beauty could be seen. He stared down at the patch of fresh dirt for a long minute. "You have no idea what you did. To all of us. But God knows I would do it again in a heartbeat. It was fun while it lasted. You just overplayed your game."

He turned on his heel and started to go get Riff.

"Dominic Crehador! Halt!"

He froze and whipped around. Right where he had placed Cain only seconds before, the disheveled dirt was covered with flowers. A round picnic table with a white tablecloth and an umbrella coming out of the top covered the spot, and there were all kinds of cakes and scones, and a pot of tea sat on top.

Cain sat, smirking, at one of the chairs. "Nice show."

"Y-you-!"

"Oh, you know the dead don't stop coming if they don't want to." He picked up the teapot and frowned. "Ah, Riff will make some when he gets here."

"If you're going to curse me, go ahead and do it," Crehador said, gritting his teeth. The one time he _didn't_ want to know what a soul would have to say to him, his gift made it appear like magic.

"Curse you? Well, if you insist." Cain leaned forward and rested his chin on his folded hands. "You know… you could have just asked. Before I died, I mean. I might have laughed at you, but I might have agreed." That same smirk, the one that had been on his lips when he died, graced his features.

"You're lying. You only saw him."

"If that were true, there wouldn't be all these chairs," he said, sighing. "I suppose we'll need two more, one for that troublesome brother of mine and his friend." He smiled. "But you probably won't come, will you? You'd rather be with Sheila."

"Are you mocking me, Cain?" Crehador demanded, angrily, storming up to the table.

"Now now! I'm just being honest!" He placed his hand on Crehador's chest. It felt cold, but there was nothing solid to it. "You have someone you love that _isn't_ me. To be frank, Riff, Merry, and Jezebel love me enough to come. The other chairs are for the friends who will follow them."

He looked up at Crehador, and his eyes were the same mysterious mix of green and gold that had always fascinated him. "You think I should curse you for what you did? I didn't appreciate you laughing or pulling my hair. Hmm.

"Your job should be to watch after Merry Weather. Until you know, for sure!, that she will be happy, you're going to be her guardian angel. But I forbid you to talk to her or see her."

"Why is that?"

"I told Merry I would keep her dainty little hands clean. Of all of this. But take this image to her on the day she finds true happiness. She should know… that she always has a place here. Where we don't have to search for those we love anymore."

He smiled and leaned up, pressing an unfelt kiss to Crehador's lips. "Bring me my Riff. But, ah… I think we won't tell him what happened." He laughed, as free from care as Crehador had ever heard him, and went back to his chair, cutting a slice of the strawberry cake.

"I did love you, you know."

"I know," Cain said, smiling. "I'm glad. I almost stared to believe Father's curse, right up until the end. But many people loved me when I died. I can rest easy and be patient. Alone and unloved… I don't wish that on anyone."

Crehador frowned. Slowly, he dropped down to one knee in a low kneel. "I hate nobility, but you, I would bow my head to, Earl Cain C. Hargreaves."

"Did I ever ask you to?! I think not!" Cain said, scoffing. "What are you waiting for? You have a lot to do."

He stood up and bowed again before turning and getting into the carriage, feeling those golden-green eyes on him the whole time.


End file.
